Responsibility to Protect (R2P)
Adopted unanimously by the UN General Assembly in 2005, the Responsibility to Protect doctrine holds:
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States have a primary responsibility to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing
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The international community has a responsibility to assist states in fulfilling this responsibility
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When a state manifestly fails to protect its population, the international community has a responsibility to act, including through coercive measures when necessary
R2P was a direct response to the failures of Rwanda and Bosnia. Its application has been controversial. The 2011 NATO intervention in Libya was justified partly on R2P grounds; the resulting regime change went beyond what some R2P supporters had intended, and Russia and China have been more reluctant to support subsequent invocations of the doctrine. The doctrine exists but its practical effectiveness remains limited.